Eastern skunk cabbage

I have seen orchids tenderly nurtured in conservatories that had not half the honest beauty of this flower.

Neither to me is the odor of the divided skunk cabbage more unpleasant than that of the many a colored and admired garden bloom, a dahlia for instance, for I smiled in derision on catching the first whiff of it and so do we all if the simple carpus cared it would be too bad but it does not unconscious of its cadish critics it blooms serenely on the swamps and it takes the tiny insects into its confidence and its hood and adds a bit of rich colour to the place where no other blossom dares And even as I looked at it, the sun slipped out of the low band of dark horizon mists and sent a golden good morning, like a benediction, right down upon the head of the humble, courageous, sturdy beauty of the Brookside.

After that approval, why should any blossom care? End of Chapter 2

CHAPTER III.